After two blown-out Sundays, spring came to the rescue and provided beautiful racing conditions for the last day of HYC’s 2024 / 2025 Dinghy Frostbite season.

A gentle breeze and the strongly flooding tide brought the fleet to the start area just as the southerly wind settled and strengthened enough to get a course laid. Despite the southerly direction typically being challenging for race management trying to set courses in Howth Sound, the fleet enjoyed two cracking races in flat water conditions, with the slowly building breeze getting the boats planning on the last reaching legs.

The stars of the overall series were undoubtedly Dan O’Connell and Daragh Sheridan. Of the nine races sailed by the ILCA 7s, Dan (RStGYC) took the gun in eight and, with two discards available, enjoyed the rare privilege of being able to discard a first. Colm Cunningham (HYC) was the only one to beat Dan and his consistent series of top three results earned him second place overall. In the ILCA 6s, Daragh Peelo (Malahide YC) had the overall win sewn up before going afloat for the last day, but cemented his position with two more firsts, creating a clear margin to runner-up Peter Hassett. Mia Kelleher (Skerries SC) took first overall in the ILCA 4s, despite the two DNCs in the last races that she was able to discard. Anna Brereton (Sutton DC) took second place overall with a consistent sequence of results that spanned from first to fourth across the series.

Daragh Sheridan (HYC), who now races an Aero 6 in the PY Fleet after many years at the front of the Laser fleet, took on the task of organising the 50th Anniversary Dinner for the Laser Frostbite, which started in 1974.  Despite the celebrations being held on the Saturday night before the last day of the current series, with lots of memories to be refreshed and old friendships to be renewed, Daragh’s performance on Sunday belied his involvement the night before and the calculation of corrected times saw him top the handicap fleet in both races. Just a single second place marred his otherwise spotless sequence of firsts – a great achievement in a handicap fleet that included a diverse range of boats including IDRA 14s, a Finn, RS 600 and lots of Melges 15s. Richard Tate (RStGYC) took second overall in his Finn, just ahead of Michael Evans, in the first of the Melges 15s.

The Melges 15s mustered a fleet of 10 boats for the series, including the HYC-owned boat that is available for charter, and they enjoyed fantastic racing on the mix of course layouts provided over the duration of the event. The three different race winners showed the competitiveness of the fleet and, going into the last day, overall victory in the Class event was still up for grabs. However, the Evans family (HYC) took both wins with Michael and his daughter Sarah each helming one of the races and demonstrating their individual ability to find the front of the fleet. The Quinns (HYC) – Stephen and son Feargal - had to accept second place in both, which put the overall win just beyond their grasp even though their final points total included nothing higher than a third place.

With the winter’s practice out of the way, focus now shifts to the long running Round the Island Race on Saturday, March 8th. The race is open to ILCAs (formerly Lasers) and all dinghies with a PY handicap lower than 1220. After a few years of big winds that made sending a dinghy fleet around the back of Ireland’s Eye impossible, this year’s forecast looks more benign and the slack neap tide on the day will make the choice of port or starboard rounding more difficult to decide. Entries can be made via the HYC website - https://www.hyc.ie/open-events?year=2025#event-557. The first gun is scheduled for 10.55 with the Ireland-France rugby match setting a deadline for everyone to be back ashore and set up in front of the one of the Club’s big screen TVs.

Click here for the full photo gallery of the Dinghy Frostbites.

---Report by Neil Murphy